What is Christology?
Christology is the study of the Person of Christ — who He is in the glory of His deity and the reality of His humanity, and the unfathomable mystery of both united in one Person.
The Central Question
F. B. Hole opens his paper The Deity and Humanity of Christ with the Lord's own challenge:
F. B. HoleThere is no greater question between the covers of the Book than that which the Lord Himself raised with the unbelieving men of His day — "What think ye of Christ?" (Matt. 22:42). In these five short words He set before them the pivotal point upon which everything turns. The deepest foundations of the faith lie here, and any error or fault in this matter is sure to make its influence felt throughout the whole building.
His Deity
Hole traces the scriptural witness from the Old Testament forward. On Isaiah 9:6 he writes:
We may sum up the whole passage by saying that there is only one word which adequately describes the real character and being of the virgin's Son, and that word is GOD.
And on Micah 5:2:
There can be no evading the force of this astounding statement. The Babe who lay in Bethlehem's manger was He whose "goings forth" had been from the days of eternity. He had gone forth as the active Worker in creation, for by Him God made the worlds.
He then analyzes John 1:1-4, identifying six tremendous facts about "the Word":
1. "In the beginning was the Word." The Word has eternal existence. 2. "The Word was with God." The Word has distinct Personality. 3. "The Word was God." The Word has essential Deity. 4. "The same was in the beginning with God." The Word has eternal Personality. 5. "All things were made by Him." The Word had creatorial originality. 6. "In Him was life." The Word has essential vitality.
His Humanity
On the completeness of Christ's manhood, Hole writes:
Hebrews 2:16-17 plainly states that since He stooped not to take hold of angels but of the seed of Abraham, "in all things it behoved Him to be made like to His brethren." Note those three important words — IN ALL THINGS. If in all things then in spirit and in soul and in body.
And on the virgin birth:
The Lord Jesus was not Adam reproduced at all. He was the second Man. He was Man, indeed, for He was conceived by the Virgin Mary. He was an altogether unique Man of another order, for He was conceived of the Holy Ghost.
God and Man in One Person
L. M. Grant addresses how deity and humanity unite:
L. M. Grant"For in Him dwells all the fulness of the Godhead bodily" (Col. 2:9). What marvellous, matchless fulness is here! It is far beyond the ability of the creature to understand the fulness of its significance, far beyond our understanding how this great manifestation can be true.
He illustrates this beautifully from the Gospels:
Consider Matthew 8:23-27. On board a sailing vessel the Lord Jesus calmly slept. He is certainly therefore Man, for God does not sleep (Ps. 121:4). But when awakened by the disciples because of their fear of the raging storm capsizing the boat, He calmly rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm. He demonstrated that He is God, the master of the elements. His sleep can be attributed only to the fact that He is Man; but His authority over wind and sea is attributable to His being God.
The Inscrutable Mystery
W. H. Westcott insists that while both deity and humanity are plainly revealed, the union of the two transcends all creature understanding:
W. H. Westcott"NO ONE KNOWS THE SON BUT THE FATHER." (Matt. 11:27)
These two statements... imply that however much has been shown to be true of Him in the Scripture, there is depth unrevealed and glory inscrutable to man in the Person of CHRIST.
He traces the Son through four great positions — eternal Sonship, Sonship in time (incarnation), Son in resurrection, and Son in ascension and glory — and then concludes:
JESUS IS GOD, and JESUS IS MAN. The inscrutable mystery lies in this, that both these glories are true, but inseparable, in the One Person. He may be viewed, now in the light of the one glory, now in the light of the other, but He is the same Christ throughout, body, soul, and spirit. His Godhead was not a distinct entity from His Manhood. He was not two persons, but One.
The Perfectness of His Manhood
J. N. Darby contemplates the scene in Gethsemane and marvels at the moral perfection of Christ as Man:
J. N. DarbyWhat I see in the Lord is, that His Spirit enters into it all thoroughly, as it was from God. I get two things: I see Him completely before God; and, on the other hand, He feels all that a man feels as a man. He goes through it all so entirely with God, so from God, that in dealing with men there is not a trace of it in His spirit, quiet and gracious. It is a wonderful thing, the perfectness, thorough sincerity and truth, in Him!
The Father's Own Declarations
F. B. Hole shows in a separate paper that the Father Himself speaks to the Son at five decisive moments — at His birth ("Thou art My Son," Ps. 2), as He enters millennial glory ("Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever," Ps. 45), in full view of death ("Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the earth," Ps. 102), in resurrection ("Sit on My right hand," Ps. 110), and as received into glory ("Thou art a Priest for ever," Ps. 110). On the third of these, spoken to the Son in the hour of the cross, Hole writes:
F. B. HoleThe Jesus who has endeared Himself to our hearts by dying is declared to be the Creator, the Sustainer, and the ultimate Finisher of all things. He is THE SAME. Here we reach — so it seems to the writer — a point beyond which it is impossible to go. The mind fails, and spiritual affections alone come to the rescue. When we can no further investigate we can worship.
Against All Theories
On attempts to rationalize the mystery, Hole is emphatic:
We hold no theory at all. Rather we hold that all theories on this sacred matter should be rigidly eschewed. The Lord's own words were, "No man knows the Son but the Father" (Matt. 11:27), and that being so it shows that there are depths of mystery about Him which the creature, however favoured and exalted, can never fathom.
Westcott concurs:
May it not be said that error as to the Person of Christ often proceeds from the audacity that tries to dissect TWO NATURES in the One Person, and thence to define which is the Divine and which is the Human?
Christology, then, is the study of the greatest question that can occupy the human heart. Scripture reveals Jesus Christ as the eternal Son of God who, without ceasing to be God, became true Man — body, soul, and spirit — for the vindication of God's glory and the redemption of His people. His deity is affirmed from Genesis to Revelation; His full and perfect humanity is proven in every detail of the Gospel record; and the union of both in one indivisible Person remains a mystery that only the Father fully knows. As Hole summed it up: "The New Testament is the revelation of the Daysman of Job's desire — JESUS, who is both GOD and MAN."